


To Break the Curse

by wordsbymeganmichael



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Cursed Captain Hook | Killian Jones, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-21
Updated: 2018-11-21
Packaged: 2019-08-27 04:42:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16695655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wordsbymeganmichael/pseuds/wordsbymeganmichael
Summary: Killian Jones has been cursed for hundreds of years, needing to take the lives of innocent women that happen upon his extravagant parties by accident until he is finally saved by the one woman who is destined to free his soul forever. Emma Swan is lost, leaving the life she had behind her in the city and searching for something new. Will they be the answers to the questions the other is asking?





	To Break the Curse

**Author's Note:**

> This story is based on a weird-ass fever dream I had when I was sick over the summer, then forgotten about for a few months and rediscovered when the muse wasn't helping with my actual works in progress. So, I hope you all enjoy this weird, cursed story that has literally haunted my dreams.

_ Every day for as long as the locals can remember, there has been a party at the castle at the top of the hill, a spectacular engagement that brings everyone together no matter who they are or what they do. No one has ever been quite sure why these parties were held, and many of them went simply out of curiosity, or to try to get a glimpse of the dashingly handsome Mister Jones, or any of the sons of the same name that inhabited the castle for centuries. None knew if they succeeded, however; even after hundreds of years, none have been able to say for sure whether they’ve seen the mysterious Jones man of their time, though some claim to have done so.  _

_ Little did they know, the secret of the Jones parties was far more mysterious than they could have ever guessed, though some many have speculated. The parties themselves are just a cover, a way for Killian Jones to bring people to his home - people from whom he then must choose his next victim, damned to take the lives of others for as long as he lives. _

_ There is, however, one who can save him, one woman that will be the end of his curse, who will learn his secrets and stay with him, break his curse and spend eternity at his side, no longer needing to take victims. He has been waiting for this woman to come through his doors for hundreds of years, to learn the truth about him and choose to stay.  _

_ He is starting to run out of patience.  _

 

* * *

In all senses of the word, Emma Swan is  _ lost _ . 

Three days ago, she was fired from her job after a rather violent verbal altercation with her boss. With nothing left for her in the city, her family all gone and never having many friends to begin with, she packed up her car, chose a direction, and left, not really having a set destination, just a new place to settle down her life and try again.

According to her GPS, she is not even on a road anymore, though she would beg to differ. She stops on the side of the road and pulls out the physical map that her father always insisted she keep with her, and even though he has been gone for almost ten years, she has never taken it out of the pocket in the back of the passenger seat. 

Switching on the interior light, she sees that it’s no help: even according to the map, there is nothing anywhere around her. She doesn't even know why she tried, since the map was still the exact one her father put in her car when she first got it, for her sixteenth birthday almost fifteen years ago. At least the GPS on her phone updates. Pulling back onto the road, she just continues on in the direction she was already heading, hoping for the best. 

She drives for another few miles before her headlights finally break through the treeline, and that is when she sees it: on top of the mountain before her, looming at her in the brightness of the morning sun, is the largest mansion she’s ever seen, perhaps even large enough to be deemed a castle. But that is not the only thing that draws her attention, for parked along the road that winds up the mountain to the mansion are cars, dozens of them. 

And for the first time in hours, Emma can sense civilization around her, a civilization that she continues driving towards. 

Emma parks, the closest spot she can find down a ways from the top of the mountain, but she has been sitting for so long that she could use the stretch. When she enters the house, it is like she has entered a dream, one that seems oddly familiar to her, where everyone around her is in flourishing gowns and sharp suits but she remains in her casual jeans-and-a-tee look. Everyone is drinking, talking, too enamored in their own actions that they barely bat an eye at her; but she follows the crowd through the grand entry hall and an astonishing living room, with mirrored walls and a large crystal chandelier having from the tall vaulted ceiling before she finds the bar, stocked full of every sort of drink you can think of, from pitchers of orange juice and cranberry juice to handles of vodka, gin, and rum. 

With nothing else to do, nowhere to go, and no idea where in the hell she is, she decides she has nothing to lose, orders a large glass of wine, and continues to explore the castle. 

 

From behind the sheer curtain covering the large windows in his bedroom, he watches her as she approaches his home, walking up the hill. He can tell that she is lost, confused, and definitely did not come specifically for the party— or simply ignored all dress codes and showed up in jeans simply to spite everyone. 

But somehow, he doubts that. 

Something about her draws his attention, and though he has no idea what it might be, he finds himself unable to tear his eyes from her. Even in her current state, wearing jeans, black boots, a white tee shirt, and a red leather jacket, her hair braided loosely over her shoulder, he finds her overwhelmingly attractive, an angel sent to him in the middle of his hellish life. He does not  _ want  _ to kill her as a part of his curse, but the rules set upon him have become very simple: choose the most beautiful, lost-looking girl to enter the castle, woo her with his charm and dashingly handsome smile, and give her one last night of lustful pleasure before he must take her life to continue his own. In the end, he has no choice— he lost that luxury over 500 years before.

And, walking up the hill towards him, Emma Swan is both the most beautiful and most lost woman he has seen in a very, very long time. 

As she walks through his doors, no doubt baffled and confused at whatever she has found herself a part of, Killian straightens his tie, re-buttons his vest, and leaves the room, heading through the labyrinth he has built himself to join the party, and to find this gorgeous mystery woman, whoever she is, the whole time thinking about what the wizard had told him so many years ago, about the woman who would show up and surprise him in ways he has not been surprised before, the woman destined to wear the dress hidden in the back of a wardrobe somewhere and unlock the secrets of his life.

It does not take very long, however; as he reaches the bottom of the stairs that open onto the main floor, she is standing there, alone in a bare corner of the room, her eyes not on the party but instead on the artwork hung on the wall before her, a large oil painting of a ship that Killian himself had painted before he was cursed over five hundred years ago. 

He continues to approach her slowly, watching her study his painting. She either senses him behind her or has looked at the canvas as much as she wanted to, and she turns around to meet his eyes, still a few feet between them. The first thing he notices about her this closely is the bright, shining green of her eyes, with enough light behind them to brighten a whole room. Feeling a magnetism between them that she cannot ignore, she takes a few steps in his direction, pulled towards him like a puppet on a string. 

Once she has slowly filled most of the space between them, he holds out his hand towards her, and she responds, expecting him to shake it when he pulls it up towards his lips and gently kisses the back of it, holding his lips against it for a few seconds, secretly venerating the feel of her pulse against his fingertips. 

“Hello, love,” he says finally, his voice heavy with a symphonious but difficult-to-place accent, and he releases her hand, letting it fall to her side.

“H-hello,” she replies, too strung up in his charm for her mind to work fast enough to create any more words. 

“I’m Killian Jones.”

“Emma. Emma Swan.” The words come a bit easier now, but she still feels them getting stuck at the back of her throat. 

He can’t help but smile at her, especially her response to his name, and his smile lights a fire in her stomach, one that she tries to extinguish with another sip of her wine. “You’re not from around here, are you?”

“Well, no. But how did you know that?”

He sweeps his eyes around the room, making sure that no one heard him introduce himself, and when he continues, his voice is so soft that she has to lean in to hear it. “Well, love, as it happens, this is my home. People come to my parties from all around just to try to get a glimpse of me, to figure out who I am, but I’ve mastered the art of keeping my identity a secret.” When he offers her his arm, she takes it after just a moment’s hesitation, and he leads her around the perimeter of the room. 

“How often do you have these parties?”

“Every day.”

“You have a party like this  _ every day _ ?”

“Aye, that I do, but don’t think it’s my bloody idea. It’s all my father’s doing, though I always found it to be a waste of time— not to mention money, with how expensive extravagance tends to be these days.”

“But you, of course, find no amusement with them?” she asks, and when he turns to look at her, she is smiling—broken through the wall of charm he has built to protect himself enough to find her own sarcasm. 

“No, no, none at all. As a matter of fact, I rarely come down to join them anymore,” he jests, returning her joke.

“Then what brings you down today?” Emma is drawn to him like a fly to honey, letting down her own defenses enough to already joke with a man she has just met, but there is an intoxicating appeal to him that she just cannot ignore. 

But it is not as though he does not feel it, too: the magnetic energy between them, the way her blood pounded through her when he took her hand in his own, or even now as she touches him arm, strong enough for him to still feel it through the fabric of his shirt. 

“To tell you the truth, Miss Swan, you did. I watched you come up towards the house from my window above the entryway, and as soon as I saw you, I just had to come down and meet you.” This, however, is not a lie, and he feels the flush of her skin against his arm, turning to her as the tips of her ears turn the same shade as her coat. “If you don’t mind me asking, what brings you here today? You obviously did not come to join the party, or to lay your eyes on the dashingly handsome Killian Jones.”

While she is surprised by his answer to her question, whether it is the truth or a well-constructed lie told to try to impress her, she is even more taken aback by  _ her _ response to  _ his _ question as the truth of her situation tumbles from her lips. “Well, three days ago, I told my boss that he needed to be more appreciative of the work others do for him, and then it may have escalated to the point where I told him to go fuck himself before I was fired. And since that job was the only thing keeping me in the city, since my parents died a week apart from each other ten years ago, last night I decided to I pack up everything I owned into my car and left it all behind me. I wasn’t going anywhere in particular, just trying to get away, and that’s when I got lost in the woods for a few hours before I came upon your little castle at the top of the hill.”

He is amazed by her, by the brutal honesty of her answer, and he finds himself craving something that he has not felt for so long: he wants to  _ help  _ her. He wants to offer her a room, a warm bath and a clean bed and somewhere to rest for a while to regain her energy after driving all day.

And so he does. 

“Swan, if you need—I have a few spare rooms in the house if you want… if you want to rest for a little.”

“Are you…” She stops them, turning herself to face him, and she places the palm of her hand gently on his chest. If his heart was still beating, he somehow knows that it would be pounding beneath her fingers. “Are you asking me to stay with you?”

“This house is big enough that you could stay here for weeks without seeing me, if that was what you wanted. But I’m simply offering you somewhere to sleep that’s not your car, if you’ll have it.”

Her father, a police officer for over twenty years, always warned her against accepting offers like this from strangers, especially ones that live in the middle of the woods. But there is something so welcoming about him, with his parties and his huge-ass mansion and his charm, that makes her want to accept, a comfort he offers her that she full well believes she would spend the rest of her life trying to find again. 

Especially after she realizes that this offer is the single nicest thing anyone has done for her in years. 

She feels the smile forming on her face before she can do anything about it, and when she finally turns her eyes back up to lose herself in the oceans behind his, he is smiling back at her. 

“Actually, Mister Jones, I think I will accept that offer. I could use it, I’ll tell you that much.”

“Killian.”

“Excuse me?”

“Please, love, call me Killian.” When he offers her his arm again, she is smiling again. 

“Only if you call me Emma.”

 

The room he leads her to is less of a ‘room’ and more of a full-blown ‘suite,’ with a mini-fridge, a microwave, a couch, and a master bathroom with a gorgeous claw-foot tub, not to mention the largest bed she has ever seen, stocked to the brim with throw pillows. Less of a surprise to her is the cleanliness of it all, not a speck of dust or dirt to be seen. As she wanders around the room, amazed by every part of it, he simply stands leaning on the doorway, watching her. 

“Are all the rooms here like this?” she asks finally, taking a seat on the edge of the bed, turning her eyes up towards him. 

“No, not all of them,” he replies with a chuckle. “Most of the rooms are just bedrooms, offices, libraries, empty. But there are three of these. This one, one facing the other direction, and mine, at the front of the house.”

“This is incredible, Mister Jones — uh, Killian.”

“Well, I’ve been doing my best to update the house with the newest technologies. The, uh, ones before me were never too keen on changing anything.” This is not far from the truth: for hundreds of years, he’s lived alone in this mansion, trying his best to hide from humanity minus the parties and a few trips to the city a year, mostly using his butlers to hide his secrets and buy his groceries. But early last year, he found himself bored enough that he began walking around, finding all of the new technology around him astounding: slim new televisions, fancy new watches that do more than tell the time, and the creation he has loved the most since discovering it:  _ the smartphone.  _ So, for the first time in centuries, he took charge of the updates around the mansion, finding more and more meaning in his life as it happened. 

“I can’t thank you enough for this. For all of this.” She falls back onto the bed, losing herself in the softness of the comforter. 

“No thanks needed, Miss Swan. Make yourself comfortable, do whatever you would like, and, most importantly, stay as long as you need. If you do choose to return to the party, feel free to help yourself to any of the dresses in the wardrobe that suit you.”

“What if I need to find you? This house is like a maze, and I’ve already been lost for a few hours today, so I would rather not continue with that.”

It is something he has not thought about yet, but he is glad that it crossed her mind as he writes his cell phone number on a piece of paper on the top of the desk. 

“If you need anything, just let me know.” And with that, he closes the door behind him. 

  
  


_ Is she the one I have been waiting for, the one that is destined to stay with me forever?  _

He knows that he should at least try to return to the party, but he instead finds himself lost in his mind, pacing up and down a hallway not far from the one he put Emma in. 

_ I have been waiting, dreaming of her, for as long as I can remember, and she looks just like I have always hoped she would. I have been so terribly alone for so long, waiting for the one who would join me for eternity. Has the time finally come?  _

He stops, taking a good look at himself in the mirror. “Pull yourself together, Jones,” he says out loud, running his fingers through his hair. Staring back at him from the other side of the mirror is a man who has spent not only the last two hours worrying, but the last  _ five hundred years _ , waiting for the woman that would save him from the hell his life has been.

_ If she  _ is  _ the one, sent to me as a companion, what if I have said something to turn her away?  _ He has tried to be nothing but charming towards her, hoping deep down that she is the one that he has spent so long waiting to come to him, a feeling he has never felt this strongly before, and now he has done exactly what he had hoped to do all along: put her and the dress that the woman who saves him is destined to wear in the same room. 

_ I guess we will see how she responds to the challenge. That wizard gave me the ball gown hundreds of years ago, and said it was only destined to be worn by the one who would be there to guide me when I needed her most. The one that I could reveal my biggest secrets to and she would not shy away from an eternity by my side. How stupid of me was it to put it all the way in the back of the closet, hidden by handfuls of other dresses?  _

Still worried, he tears his eyes away from the man in the mirror, needing to go back to the party before he drives himself insane. But as he snakes his way back through the hallways, hoping his feet know well enough where they are going to not need the assistance of his mind, all he can see is that damned dress, blood red and covered in silver crystals, diamonds, sequins - the dress that has haunted his dreams since it was gifted to him. 

He has been waiting long enough for her to come and save him - is this finally the day he has always dreamed about?

* * *

After spending a few minutes searching the suite in awe, Emma decides to do something that she has not done in a very long time, possibly since she was a girl. She finds a clean towel and a bathrobe in the closet, then sets them on the sink, running the hot water to fill the beautiful clawfoot tub. 

When she lowers herself into the suds, she feels the tension melt out of her muscles, a literal weight lifting from her shoulders. Unbeknownst to her, Killian paces in the hallway not far from her, his mind stuck in the past; but as she lets herself relax for what feels like the first time ever, her mind is more focused on the future. 

The whole purpose of this journey was to find a new beginning, to build a new life for herself, not one that was built on a foundation set before her by her father. She did not have a destination in mind, just went in the direction of what felt right. What if she ended up right where she was supposed to be, in the clawfoot bathtub of this mysterious, handsome millionaire?

Her mother always talked about fate, about everyone having a destiny already set before them, somewhere they would end up no matter what kinds of decisions they made. 

Of course, she and her father never believed these sorts of things. Everyone created their own destinies, wound up where they were because of their actions, not in spite of them. It was one of very few things that she and David agreed upon - and, of course, became a regular topic around the dinner table. 

But no matter which was true, predetermined destinies or self-created lives, there is still one fact she cannot ignore:  _ something _ brought her here, brought her across the very path that could have led her anywhere in the country, and that brought her to the mansion of Killian Jones. 

What would the harm be if she decided to stay? She has no one else, no belongings minus the few things packed in the back seat of her yellow Bug. 

_ You know what the harm could be, Emma, _ her father’s voice says in the back of her head.  _ He could be some serial killer that uses his secluded mansion to prey on women who have no one to miss them.  _

Of course, her father always thought the worst of everyone; his mind was trained for that, after so many years of working as a policeman. But Emma has never agreed with his point of view—and so far, she hasn’t been killed by anyone, so it’s worked out for her. 

There is something so casually charming about Mr. Jones, a radiance that seems to draw her towards him. And her own conscience would never betray her like that, right? 

And, beyond that, there is an attraction between them, stronger than anything she has felt towards a man since… Well, for a very long time, at least. The least she can do is act on this feeling, spend some time in his enormous mansion pampering herself, maybe even act on her impulses and have some fun with the millionaire.

And if it didn’t work out, she could jump in her car and leave this whole surreal paradise behind her. 

So, the only choice she has left is much smaller: what is she going to do  _ now?  _ She pulls her hand out of the water, seeing just how wrinkled the tips of her fingers have been after being in the tub for what feels like days; but when she looks at the time on her phone, she is surprised to discover that just under an hour has passed since she lowered herself into the warm water. 

The towel that she wraps herself in is one of the softest she has ever felt, a soft light blue that reminds her of Killian’s blazing eyes. She can’t help herself: the first thing she does is falls backwards into the plush down of the bright white comforter. Pulling the blanket around her, she lets the towel loosen, curling up in the cocoon she has built around herself. 

But as tired as she may be, she finds herself unable to fall asleep in the comfort of the bed, her mind racing around too many thoughts, most of them about Mr. Jones. 

Finally, when she has realized that it is no longer worth trying to sleep, she sees the wardrobe out of the corner of her eye and remembers what he told her before he left her here: if she wants to return to the party, she can find a dress that would suit her. And so she decides that if she can find something that she would actually want to wear, she would return to the party— a toss-up, because she was never the dress-wearing sort of person, especially not formal ball gowns. 

Pulling herself off the bed and tightening the towel back around her body, she makes her way across the room to the wardrobe, feeling the ornate carvings in the doors under her fingertips before pulling it open. There really is a whole collection for her to choose from, the entirety of the four-foot width stuffed with dresses. They are in no sort of order, definitely not organized, but she still rummages through all of them, feeling all types of fabric under her fingers. There are dresses in every color, some bright, some more muted; white ones and black ones; cocktail dresses, formal dresses, ball gowns with their crinoline skirts—and even with all of the choices, nothing catches her eye in the way that she needs it to. She almost gives up, pulls her arms down from the hangers to turn away, when she sees it, the flash of bright red tucked away at the end of the rack, squeezed between the wood and a little black cocktail dress. Pushing everything away from it, she manages to pull it out of the wardrobe and sets it down on the bed, smoothing the wrinkles down under her hands. 

It truly is one of the most magnificent things she has ever seen, more beautiful than she has ever found an article of clothing in her life. It is made entirely of perfect red silk, smooth between her fingers, and covered in rows of sparkling gems and sequins. 

So she takes it off of the hanger, unzips the zipper that runs up the side of the dress, and steps into it. If it fits her, she decides, then she will go back downstairs. If not, she will drop it back to the floor, climb back in bed, and sleep in the most comfortable cloud she has ever felt.

And, of course, as she adjusts the neckline after zipping back up and turns to look at herself in the mirror, she has made up her mind. 

  
  


For just a moment, she stands at the top of the steps and takes in the scene below her without anyone seeing her. But once the first person at the party catches sight of her, it is a chain reaction, and she is only down a few steps by the time every eye in the room is on her.

At first, she cannot find the bright blue of his eyes in the crowd, and she feels her heart drop, though she is trying to keep her mind focused on descending the stairs. And then she finds him, alone in the corner by the bar but pushing through the crowd towards her. Her feet, bare against the cold stone, continue to descend down the steps even after her mind is focused only on Killian. By the time she reaches the floor, every eye in the room has turned to her, but the only pair that she cares about are the bright blue ones waiting for her at the bottom of the steps, lit up by the smile covering his face. 

And Killian? Well, if his heart hadn’t stopped beating hundreds of years ago, he is absolutely sure that it would have right now. She is a vision, an angel that can only be part of a dream, but when he presses his lips against the knuckles of her hand and feels the warmth of her in his hand, he knows that this cannot be a dream. 

“Miss Swan, it looks as though that dress was made for you.”

Finally, a smile spreads across her face, one that she was too nervous to let out as she was coming down the steps. 

“I can’t tell you how glad I am that you’ve come back to my party.”

With one arm laced through his elbow, she takes the other and presses it against his chest, smiling up at him. 

“Well, it’s all I could do for all the hospitality you’ve extended me.”

With her hand planted on his chest, right over where his heart stopped beating hundreds of years before, he feels something he hasn’t felt in nearly as long: a warmth, starting beneath where his shirt separates the tips of her fingers from the skin of his chest, spreading across his whole body, into the tips of his fingers and the very ends of his toes. For a moment, he can barely breathe—but it only lasts a moment, and she pulls her hand away from his chest and it is over. 

“Believe me, love, it’s my absolute pleasure. Now, what can I get you to drink?”

 

The next few hours pass, feeling more like minutes than anything, glasses of wine melting into rum. Killian asks her about her life in the city, and she asks about his life here in the mansion, his parents, his childhood. Everything he tells her is close enough to the truth: that his father was a selfish prick who was never home, who finally drank himself to death—she just doesn’t need to know that it all happened almost six hundred years ago, when Killian was just a teenager. In response, Emma tells him about her father, all the years he spent trying to protect her from every danger, which ended in her becoming a rebellious teenager who ran away for a few years before her mother got sick. 

Emma watches as his eyes fall to the floor in front of him, his hand spinning one of the rings on the hand holding his glass of rum. 

“You and I have that one in common then, love,” he says, his voice much softer than the rest of the night, his eyes still set on a spot on the floor. It’s a side of him so unlike everything else she has seen so far, less confident and outgoing and more… nervous? Shy? Embarrassed, even. 

In response to his new mask, Emma reaches over and sets her hand on his knee, causing his eyes to fly up to meet hers, a smile pulling at the corner of his lips. 

“I’m sorry, love, that was unnecessarily dark. We don’t—we can stay away from that particular memory lane, if you would prefer.”

“I don’t mean to ruin your party, Killian.”

“Believe me, darling. Nothing you could do would ruin my party. I’ve been to so many of these that I have lost count, but I can tell you with full assurance that this is the greatest one I have ever had, simply because you are here.”

Emma blushes, feeling the warmth rise up her cheeks and to the tips of her ears. “I bet you talk to all the girls you meet at these parties like that.”

He chuckles, rebuilding his confidence little by little. “Even if I do, love, I can assure you that I’ve never meant it as much as I do right now.”

If Emma’s father had taught her anything, it was how to know when she was being lied to. David had called it his ‘superpower,’ and it was believed to be the reason that he still had the best record for clean confessions that the precinct had ever seen, even years after his retirement and passing. Emma may never have used it for interrogations, but it still reaped its rewards during her lifetime—and sitting here, on the couch next to Killian Jones, is one of these times. She stares at him for a moment, her eyebrows furrowed as they search his eyes for any sign that he is just playing her, but no matter how deep into his bright blue oceans she swims, she finds only sincerity. 

And  _ damn  _ if his perfect sincerity is not the single hottest thing she has ever witnessed in her life, especially after he slides his tongue over his bottom lip, which has turned up completely into a smile. 

Their conversation grows again, this time to jobs. Killian admits that he has never worked in his life because he has never needed to, though he has recently taken up journalism, pieces he could write from home, as well as painting, especially the views from the top of the other side of the mountain the house is built into. 

“I suppose being an artist is the best way to live out your days in this huge-ass mansion, then, huh?” Emma asks, smiling as she brings her glass to her lips. “Why don’t you just leave?”

His eyes flash for a moment, taken aback by the question he’s never before thought about the answer to, but he has timed it perfectly with Emma’s taking a drink, causing her to miss it. 

“I would no doubt be bombarded if I went to the closest town, which is twenty minutes from here and home to about two-hundred people. Before long, they would all recognize me, make me some sort of bloody celebrity. And it’s over an hour to the closest city, and that is just too much of a hassle to do every day, though I do try to go two or three times a month.” None of it is technically a lie; he just fails to include the part that he has been the same age for over 500 years, and someone in the small town would be bound to notice that, or someone from the parties would begin to recognize that, completely blowing his cover. “So most of my days are spent painting and writing, or hiking. And there’s a gorgeous lake about half a mile over the crest of the hill, where I have a boat that I spend a lot of time on.”

Emma drops her arm to her lap, hanging her head over her hands as she begins to laugh.  

“Have I said something humorous?” 

Sighing, Emma shakes her head. “It’s just— when I think about handsome millionaires that live in huge, secluded mansions in the middle of the woods, I always assume they do really solitary things, like paint and go boating and have fully stocked Bat Caves.”

“You spend a lot of time thinking about handsome millionaires that live in secluded mansions then, do you?” She blushes again, but this time refuses to break eye contact with him, even as he adds, “And, as for Bat Caves, you’ll just have to stick around and see all that I have to offer for yourself.” He grins at her, a grin that stirs something inside her, a warmth that starts as a shudder in her chest and settles as a weight behind her stomach when he adds a wink. 

Trying to hide the effect he has on her, she rolls her eyes and takes another sip of her drink. 

“Maybe I might.” She doesn’t know what makes her say this, and even as the words are coming out of her mouth, they surprise her. But, no matter how much of a surprise they come out as, she soon finds she does not regret them, especially when the smile already plastered across his face spreads into one more relaxed as he stretches to wrap his arm around her shoulders. 

“Well, I will answer any question you have for me.”

“About anything?” She turns her eyes up to him once more just in time for him to watch something flash through them, and he can't stop the way his eyebrows raise as a response to her challenge.

He nods. “Aye,” he says, and then leans in close, his lips almost touching her ear as he whispers, “Except the Bat Cave.” 

“Of course,” she responds with a chuckle. “Because the Bat Caves are confidential.”

“Precisely.”

“Alright.” She takes a sip of her drink as she ponders this, and he mimics her movement. “You said your father made the money that allows you to live this lavish lifestyle. What did he do?”

“He operated a few import-export companies that my grandfather started, which quickly monopolized the entire Eastern seaboard in his time, and still operate in just about every major city all over the world.” Every word he speaks is true— she just doesn't need to know that he actually started this company in the early 1700s, and it has grown into the monopoly it has become solely through his own work. Like the mansion, he has kept the business operating with updates for the changing times, acclimating to three hundred years worth of changes. 

His response impresses her, he can tell. “So, as long as people around the world continue to trade, you will continue to be able to live like this?” 

“Honestly, if the entire world decided tomorrow that they were going to do away with trade, the Jones family would probably be able to continue to be millionaires for a few generations.”

She leans back into the couch, raising her eyes to the ceiling as she shakes her head. “No offense to you, Killian, but that's just fucking insane. You know that, right?”

Killian chuckles. “Aye, I do think about that from time to time. My grandmother was raised in the slums of Ireland, helped my grandfather raise six children and start a business, and never had anywhere close to the luxuries I've had for almost my whole life.”

“And will continue to have for generations,” she adds, lifting her glass to her lips and pausing a moment before finishing the rest. After watching her, Killian does the same, then pulls his arm away from her shoulders and pushes himself up off the couch, offering her his hand for assistance. 

“We should get our drinks sooner than later. It's almost sunrise, and last call will be any minute now.” 

She walks with him back to the bar, her arm threaded through his. “So that's when you kick everyone out of the house, then? Sunrise?” 

He nods, swiveling his head to take a look at the dwindling crowd of people left by this point in the night. “Usually people start to arrive around nine, sometimes ten, and start to leave around one or two, always disheartened that they have once again failed to meet the  _ elusive  _ Mr. Jones, but when the sun starts to rise— it makes itself very prominent, shining right through that front window as soon as it peeks over the horizon— they always funnel out of here.”

“Doesn't anyone around here have jobs?”

“Trust me, Miss Sean, I have asked myself that question time and again. I have even gone so far as to research what people have to say on forums about this on the Internet, because  _ believe me _ , they are there, and people seem to claim that when they spend the night here, taking in the charms and cheer of the party, drinking just enough to feel the high, they can go about the next day as if they have had a full night's sleep instead of spending it here. I can't even begin to explain why, but yet people continue to return, night after night.” 

This last addition is a lie— the first one he has told Emma Swan outright— but she is suddenly too distracted by the people around her to pay attention. The energy that the Jones Mansion emits is a part of his curse, a characteristic built to continue to bring people back to him. 

But she does not need to know that. 

At least, not yet. 

But, standing in the short line at the bar with her, feeling the warmth of her arm through his, her body close enough that he can feel the heat radiating off of it— and not to mention the way that damned red dress fits her perfectly, accentuating every part of her body just right— he realizes for the first time just how much he  _ wants  _ her to be the one. He had been drawn to her from the moment he saw her come up the pathway to the house, felt the need to make her comfortable enough that she would want to stay, and had felt another physical need when he saw her come down those steps. He had been drawn to women before— and heaven knows there was no shortage of women at any point in his life that were drawn to him. 

But never like this. Never before had someone like Emma Swan walked into his life and affected him in a way that made him want to spend the rest of his life with her by his side. 

They order two more glasses of rum, this time taking them to a standing cocktail table not far from the bottom of the stairs. He watches her as her eyes float from painting to painting again, stopping finally on the same ship that she was looking at when he first approached her. “That's always been one of my favorites, as well,” he says after a few moments, and when she turns her eyes back to him, he is smiling. 

“Did you paint this?”

He nods. “Aye, I did. The best piece I've ever done, I like to believe.”

“It's incredible, really. Truly spectacular.” 

“Thank you.” 

“Is it a real ship? Was it one of your father's?”

“My grandfather's, actually. His first one, called her 'The Jewel of the Realm.’ She was built in England, but he sailed her to America and started his business here.” 

“And you know what she looks like well enough to have painted her?”

If it were still possible for Killian Jones to blush, he would have at this moment. Instead, he reaches his hand up and scratches the back of his neck, averting his eyes to the table between them. “Actually, I've fully restored her, and she's living out her days on a dry dock in the basement that can open up to the lake behind the house.” 

He looks back up at her just in time to see her eyes widen, her entire face lighting up with a smile. “So there  _ is  _ a Bat Cave!” she cries, perhaps a little too excitedly, then begins to laugh. 

Killian's breath catches in his throat at the sound of her laughter. It's perfect and the most beautiful sound he has ever heard— but it's not the first time he has heard it. This laughter has been the soundtrack to his dreams for five hundred years, the one thing about the woman that was destined to save him that the witch would let him know. 

And now she is  _ here _ , in front of him, laughing at the fact that there's a cave under his house that's home to a ship, the very same laugh of the woman that would be sent to save his soul and live with him in peace for eternity. 

If he needed another sign, this was it. 

When she finally stops laughing and is able to get a good look at the seriousness that has taken over Killian's expression, her smile begins to fade, worried that she has done something to insult him. 

Instead, he surprises her by putting his glass of rum down on the table and walking around it, wrapping one hand gently around her wrist and pressing the other against her cheek, slow enough to give her time to back away if he made her uncomfortable, if the gesture was unwelcome. 

She does not move. In fact, when his hand reaches her face, she closes her eyes for a moment, relishing in the feel of it, and reaches her own free hand out to press against his chest. 

When he finally finds the nerve to speak, his mouth is dry, a feeling he has gone without for so long. “I know this may be a little out of line, Miss Swan, but would you— would you be at all interested in doing me the honor of joining me upstairs?” 

She expects to feel some sort of pulls away from him, something at the back of her mind, but she does not — all of her second-guessing has disappeared. 

“Yes,” she says pointedly, her eyes never leaving his, and after a moment, he smiles softly at her before breaking their contact to look around for one of his servants. 

The closest one to them is an older man, with curly salt-and-pepper hair and a matching beard. He leans in and says something into the man's ear, and he nods in return, turning his attention first to the bartender, who has just finished satisfying the ‘last call’ needs of the guests left in line. Killian stands next to her once more, his hand settling onto the small of her back, and they watch as the man pushes through what is left of the crowd towards the front door.

“Mister Jones thanks all of you for coming this evening and hopes that you have enjoyed being here as much as he has enjoyed having you.” It is a prepared, well-practiced speech, one that many of the guests have heard before, so they also know what it means. They begin to gather their belongings, leaving cups and glasses strewn across the house, but within just a few minutes, which feel comically short to Emma, they are gone.  

As the servant closes the door behind the last upset guest, she takes his hand once more and follows him up the steps, through hallways that never seem to end, before she finally loses her patience, stopping him in the middle of a hallway by stepping in front of him. For a moment, they both stand there, his hands on her hips and hers pressed flat against his chest, simply staring at the other. And then Emma makes the first move, fisting as much of the fabric of his shirt as she can and pulling him towards her lips. 

She is far from gentle, too overwhelmed by her excitement to hold back anything, asking almost immediately for entrance into his mouth by swiping her tongue across his bottom lip. But even through her impatience, Killian holds his ground, wrapping his arms around her waist, then sliding one up her back to anchor it in her hair. 

When she pulls away from him, it is just far enough to look into his eyes, which are slowly darkening with his lust for her. “A whole damn mansion full of rooms, and you’re taking me to the farthest one?” she asks, pressing her lips against his cheek, feeling the hair off his scruff on her lips as she runs them down his jaw and onto his neck.

But before she can kiss him there, he pulls her head back gently by the hair and kisses her again, pushing her against the wall, as much excitement and fervent passion as the first kiss; and as much as he does not want to, he stops her when she begins to untie his tie, taking her hands in his. 

“Patience, love,” he says, his voice suddenly deep, dripping with the same lust she feels. 

They kiss again, a simple peck of the lips which lingers for a moment before Killian pulls them apart, his hand tethered to hers as if his life depended on it ( _ it just might _ ), and continues down to the end of the hallway, turning once more to where it finally dead-ends into his master suite, the one room in the mansion that he has never brought another woman. 

As soon as they are through the door, her hands are back on him, loosening his tie once again. And this time, he lets her, finding her lips with his as she discards it on the floor. His body has her pressed against the door, only enough space between them for her to begin unfastening the buttons of his vest, which quickly joins his tie somewhere behind them. 

But when he feels her fingers on the buttons of his shirt, undoing the first few just enough to slide her hands under it and feel the hair that covers his chest, run her fingernails against his skin, and he takes her hands in his, holding them between their bodies as he slides his lips down her neck, kissing all the way down until he runs the tip of his tongue gently along her collarbone.

“Stay with me, Emma,” he whispers against her throat, feeling her pulse against his lips. 

“I  _ am  _ with you.” 

He pulls his head back enough to look into her bright green eyes, running his thumb against the soft skin of her cheek. “No, not just right now. Stay with me, here. Forever.” 

“Forever is a long time.” He can feel her pulse quicken, a fight-or-flight symptom, the flash of uncertainty across her face. 

He wants to tell her the truth. The  _ whole  _ truth, for the first time in his life. 

So he does.  

“You have no idea, love. I have already spent a hundred lifetimes without you, and I don’t want another moment with you not at my side.” 

She stops him, looks into his eyes, and  _ knows _ he is telling the truth. 

“I’ve been cursed, Emma,” he continues without needing to be coaxed — he has believed in enough in his life, he does not need any more motivation to believe in destiny, not after everything that has already happened since Emma Swan entered his house. “Cursed to spend my life preying on women and taking their lives to protect mine. And it is a curse I have lived with for hundreds of years. But I was told once, a very long time ago, that a woman would enter my life one day, out of the blue, with no idea how she got there, but she would choose to never walk out. A woman destined to wear this dress, and destined to save me. Because once I found her, I would no longer need to take the lives of others, would no longer need to live off of them. She would save me from the curse I have been burdened with, and we would have the rest of eternity to do whatever we damned well please.” 

Her eyes fall to the floor and she leans back against the door, though whether it is in response to him or in trying to get as far away from him as she can, he is unsure. After a moment, she slowly raises her head, looking intently into his eyes once more in search for answers. “And you think I am this woman?” 

“I don’t think, love. In fact, I’ve never been more sure of anything in all the lifetimes I’ve lived.” With these words, all she finds in his face is the truth, and he takes a few steps back from her, leaving her leaning against the door, and he sits on the bed, watching her as he continues. “But it is your decision. If you choose to leave, I am not going to stop you.”

But for the first time in her life, there is nothing inside of her that says no, nothing trying to convince her that she needs to leave - and so she does not. Instead, she does what feels the most right:  reaches for the zipper under her left arm and unzips it, letting it fall to the floor before stepping out of it and over to him, his eyes never once leaving his. 

“Then let me save you, Killian.”

* * *

When he wakes up beside her in the morning, Killian can  _ feel  _ the curse has been lifted. He can't quite explain how, but he knows it is the truth. 

When they finally pull themselves out of bed, he gives Emma the grand tour of the Jones Mansion, expanding on his history and correcting all of the small lies in the stories he told the night before so as to not scare her away— while his father passed away in the middle of the 15th century, Killian himself started an import-export business with 'The Jewel of the Realm’ (which he shows her, down in the Bat Cave) when he first moved to America in the 18th century, already cursed and beginning to build his fortune. Within fifty years, he had enough to build the mansion and had, in fact, taken over the Eastern Seaboard, being able to live a life here in financial peace, and trying his best to hide away from the world, hoping to hide from his curse. 

He thinks that is why the parties started. He came downstairs one night soon after moving out here to find his living room crowded with guests, all dressed to go to a ball, being served drinks and food that he was sure he did not order nor have the ingredients to create. And they just kept happening, night after night, for almost two hundred and fifty years. 

Around midnight that night, Killian's head servant, a man named William Smee, stops the party and announces that this will be the last Jones party for the time being, which is met with a chorus from the upset partygoers, until he then directs everyone's attention to the top of the stairs, where Killian and Emma are waiting to be announced. This seems to change their countenances, their groans quickly turning into applause. 

Together, they walk around and meet the guests, more social than either of them have been their entire lives, but it is all for good cause. The next morning, Killian packs a bag of clothing and his painting supplies and they load into Emma's bug, picking a destination on the map and traveling the country, then the world. But every few months, they find themselves pulled back to the Jones Mansion in the middle of the woods, spending a few nights there (and usually holding a party or two) before heading off again. 

And this is how it goes for the two of them, finally able to have their happy ending together. 

Forever. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! Comments are my life's blood, or come tell me how you really feel on tumblr: thejollyroger-writer


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